Fancy Tabb never laughed: and this was the queerer because she had a sense of humour beyond her years. Though by no means a gleeful child she could express glee naturally enough: but a joke merely affected her with silent convulsive twitchings, as though the risible faculties struggled somewhere within her but could not bring the laugh to birth. These spasms of mirth, whatever had provoked them, were cut short--and her explanation too--by a heavy footstep on the stairs. "Cap'n Hunken!" she announced, and went to open the door. "Most like he wants to talk business with you same as Cap'n Hocken did this morning, and I'd better make myself scarce. That's the silly way they've taken to behave, 'stead of callin' together." "Ay, you're sharp, missy," said her master. "But 'twon't be the same arrand this time, as it happens: so you're wrong for once." Fancy, if she heard, did not answer, for 'Bias by this time had reached the landing without. She opened to him. "Good afternoon, sir." "Afternoon, missy. I saw your father in the shop, and he told me to walk up. Mr Rogers disengaged?" "Ay, Cap'n--walk in, walk in!" said Mr Rogers from his chair. What is it to-day? Business? or just a pipe and a chat?" "Well, it's business," allowed 'Bias with a glance at the girl. "But I'll light a pipe over it, if you don't mind." "And I'll fit and make tea for you both," said Fancy. "It's near about time." She vanished and closed the door behind her. 'Bias found a chair, seated himself, and filled his pipe very slowly and thoughtfully. Mr Rogers waited. "The business that brings me--" 'Bias paused, struck a match and lit up--"ain't quite the ordinary business." "No?" "No." For a few seconds 'Bias appeared to be musing. "In fact you might call it a--a sort o' flutter. That's the word--ain't it?--when you take a bit o' money and play venturesome with it, against your usual habits." "Ay?" Mr Rogers looked at him sharply. "When I say venturesome," continued 'Bias, "you'll understand I don't mean foolhardy. . . . Nothin' o' the sort. I want to hear o' something tolerably safe, into which a man might put a small sum he happened to have lyin' about." "What sort of investment?" "Ay, that's just what I want you to tell me. Ten per cent, we'll say, an' no more'n a moderate risk. . . . I reckoned as a man like you might know, maybe, o' half a dozen things o' the sort." "What's the amount?" Mr Rogers's eyes, that had opened wide for a moment, narrowed themselves upon him in a curiosity that hid some humour. "Put it at a hundred pound." "Oh!--er--I mean, is that all?" "You see," exclaimed 'Bias. "You mustn' run away wi' the notion that I ain't satisfied as things are. Four and five per cent--and that's what you get for me--does best in the main. I can live within the income and sleep o' nights. But once in a way--" "Ay," interrupted Mr Rogers, "and more especially when _it's to oblige a friend_."